Recoiling-barrel firearm.



Patented Jan. 4,1910.

T. O. JOHNSON.

BEGOILING BARREL FIREARM.

' APPLICATION FILED FEB. 4, 1909.

UNITED s'rafrigs PATENT ormcn.

THOMAS C. JOHNSON, OF NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT, ASSIGNOR TO WINCHESTER REPEATING ARMS 00., OF NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT, A CORPORATION.

RECOILING-BARRIEL FIREARM.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented J an. 4;, 1910.

Application filed February 4, 1909. Serial No. 476,062.

To all 114mm it may concern:

Be it known that I, THOMAS C. JOHNSON, a citizen of the United States, residing at New. Haven, in the county of New Haven and State of Connecticut, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Recoiling- Barrel Firearms; and I do hereby declare the following, when taken in connection with the accompanying drawings and the numerals of reference marked thereon, to be a full, clear, and exact description of the same, and which said drawings constitute part of this specification, and represent, in

Figure 1 a broken view in side elevation of a gun embodying my invention. Fig. a View of the gun in vertical section on the line aZ) of Fig. 1 and looking rearward at the front end of the breech-block Fig. 3 a corresponding view on the same line, but looking forward against the rear end of the barrel-extension and shell. Fig. 4 a broken sectional view on the line 0-0! of Figs. 2 and 3.

My invention relates to an improvement in that class of breech-loading firearms having reciprocating breech-closures. In these guns, as ordinarily constructed, the user has no way of certainly telling, when the gun is closed, whether there is a cartridge in the cartridge-chamber or not.

The object of my present invention is to enable the user of such a gun to readily and certainly tell by a visual inspection of it and without opening the breech-closure, whether or not there is a cartridge in the chamber of the gun-barrel.

lVith this end in view my invention consists in a breech-loading gun having a reciprocating breech-closure and provided with flaring peep-notches exposing the rear end of the cartridge-chamber in the gun-barrel so as to reveal the presence of a cartridge therein or the absence of a cartridge therefrom.

For the illustration of my invention, I-

have shown it as applied to a recoilingbarrel gun though its use is not limited to such guns as already indicated. The gun shown has a peep-notch 2 formed in the breechblock 3 and a peep-notch 2 formed in the extension A} of the gun-barrel 5, the said notches being extended or cut inw-ard so as to expose a portion 6 of the rim 7 of a cartridge 8 in the cartridge-chamber 9 of the gun-barrel 5.

As the term cartridge-chamber is here used, it is intended to include the space receiving the rim of the cartridge in addition to the space receiving the body thereof. These peep-notches 2 and 2 taken together form a flaring observation opening more open at its outer than at its inner end so as to give ample opportunity for the light to strike into it upon the said exposed portion 6 of the rim of a cartridge in the cartridge-chamber 9. As shown, also, the axis of the said observation opening inclines rearward so as to be more in line with the eye as the gun is ordinarily held. Of course the larger the opening and the more flaring its form, the better; but a relatively small opening extendin inward so as to expose a small portion of the rim of the cartridge will answer the purpose of my invention as the bright color of the brass of the rim will catch and reflect even a very small amount of light and quickly reveal to the user of the gun the presence of a cartridge in the cartridge-chamber. If the user of the arm on a very casual inspection of the gun sees no bright reflection of light at the bottom of the opening, he may be certain that there is no cartridge in the chamber. If there is no cartridge in the cartridge chamber, the bottom of the opening will be black as no light will be reflected from it.

I am aware that military guns have been constructed with gas-vents positioned so as to permit the escape of any gas that may find its way to a point in front of the firing-pin. These gas-vents have been, and must necessarily be, extremely small so as to prevent the escape of too much gas at this point. But no gun of the prior art, so far as I am aware, has an opening in the bolt itself for the purpose of looking into the cartridgechamber. Military guns use -solid head cartridges. Such guns require gas-vents, but none of them call for observation openings in the breech-closure to enable the user to look into the cartridge-chamber.

I claim In a recoiling-barrel breech-loading shotgun, the combination with a frame or receiver having an ejection opening in one of its side walls, of a recoiling-barrel, barrelextension and breech -block, the barre1-extens pecification in the 5 end of the cartridge chamber in the gunbarrel.

In testimony whereof, I have signed this I presence of two subscrib- THOMAS C. JOHNSON.

Witnesses GEORGE DUDLEY SEYMOUR,

CLARA L. WEED. 

